The 10 most-read blog posts of 2014—a list that provides a good snapshot of topics I regularly cover, such as genetics, chronic pain, medical decision making, parenting, and Christianity. [Read more...]

TIME Magazine online picked up my post from earlier this week on whether a parent might regret bearing a child who inherits a difficult, painful genetic disorder. (TIME.com has a cooperative agreement with Patheos that allows them to select several Patheos posts every week for publication on their site.) The post is being shared widely, by [Read More...]

I’m not necessarily opposed to three-parent embryos. But I am opposed to sanctioning this technology, and others like it, without first considering the actual moral conundrums they raise, not the well-meaning but ultimately immaterial ones so often discussed in articles like this one. [Read more...]

“Look at those fingers! And her toes! So long and skinny…just like yours, Ellen.” I don’t recall how many people uttered those words during the early weeks of my firstborn’s life. Maybe only two or three. But I felt bombarded by this innocent observation. Shortly after my daughter’s birth, my husband, who accompanied her for [Read More...]

Imagine you are standing at an intersection with your child, waiting for a walk light so you can safely cross the street. The traffic light turns red, the “walk” sign lights up, you grab your child’s hand, and just as you are about to step off the curb, a mysterious voice from above says, “Stop! [Read More...]

Messages about Andrew Solomon’s new book, Far from the Tree: Parents, Children, and the Search for Identity have been coming steadily into my inbox over the past few days. The author interviewed hundreds of families in which a child has some identifiable difference—autism, Down syndrome, violent criminal tendencies, being the child of rape. His resulting [Read More...]

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"Part memoir, part theological treatise, [No Easy Choice] offers a refreshingly candid and nuanced grappling with assisted reproduction...This well-written, insightful account should serve as a resource to anyone who ponders the intersection of medicine, ethics, and parenthood."—Publishers WeeklyORDER NOW